


To everything, a season

by ThisShipHasSails



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Episode: s11e06 Demons of the Punjab, F/F, Missing Scene, thasmin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-22
Updated: 2018-11-23
Packaged: 2019-08-27 18:11:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16707493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisShipHasSails/pseuds/ThisShipHasSails
Summary: Missing scene, Demons of the Punjab. Also, the reason why 13 and Yaz did not hug at the end of the episode: that hug already happened. And it’s a good one, the Doctor hopes.





	1. Chapter 1

The nights in the Punjab are warm this time of year. Not that Yaz knew this before. She has never been to the country that once was her family’s home. She, like her mother before her and her sister after her, was born in Sheffield. Of all places. She does not know any other home. And yet, knowing now that her Nani used to call this land home, she feels a connection to this place that she cannot quite explain, not even to herself. She wonders whether this is what people mean when they talk about homelands.

She finds it impossible to fall asleep on the make-shift bed that her Nani, her Nani, made for her earlier in the corner of her house. Not with all the things that happened during the day, and not with all the things that she knows will happen tomorrow. Her Nani will lose the man she loves on the day she marries him, and Yaz finds the knowledge almost too much to bear. 

Instead of continuing to toss and turn, she gets up and makes her way towards the door, quietly, so as not to wake the other women. She is not surprised when she sees the Doctor standing at the edge of the field, looking up at the stars. Yaz has seen people look at the night sky before, but she thinks the Doctor looks at the stars differently. And the difference, she suddenly realises, is the difference between longing and belonging.

She is almost shy now to approach the woman who has turned her life upside down and who she cares for more than she is yet ready to admit – to herself, the Doctor, and, most of all, to her mum. She is suddenly jealous of Umbreen for her confidence in admitting to love against the odds.

It is the thought of her grandmother’s love that breaks her silence.

“Doctor, we cannot let this happen.”

The Doctor turns to her and looks into her eyes. And whatever it is that she finds there makes her gaze soft as she presses her lips together and sighs quietly.

“Yaz – ”

She knows the answer but cannot accept it, so she interrupts her. “Doctor, please. There must be something we can do!”

“Yaz, listen to me. This has to happen. This will happen. In your future, it has already happened. This is a fixed point in time in your timeline. Changing it means that you might not exist. And I will not let this happen.”

An echo in her mind: We can’t have a universe with no Yaz! Where those words had filled her with warmth before, they now send chills through her body, as she realises the responsibilities that come with surviving.

“This is not your decision to make”, she says coldly, and by the sound of her voice she recognizes that she is angry. Angry at the Doctor for caring so much about her. For protecting her, even if that means not saving Prem. 

“And it’s not yours either.” Where Yaz’s voice was angry, the Doctor’s is soft, but determined. It is also filled with sorrow for the woman in front of her, a sorrow that is mirrored in her eyes.

Yaz wants to protest, but then the truth of the Doctor’s words hits her hard. She closes her eyes. Sees her mother, her sister. Her grandfather. And suddenly all the anger she was feeling just seconds ago flows out of her and leaves her completely empty. All her energy is gone, and she can barely stand now.

The Doctor sees her swaying on the spot and more by instinct than conscious thought takes a step towards her and puts her arm around Yaz’s waist. She is glad when she feels her leaning in, accepting the support as much as the closeness. 

“So nothing we do makes a difference.” Yaz’s voice is now so quiet that the Doctor has to lean in to make out the words. 

“That’s not true”, she answers, just as softly. “You were here on the evening before your grandmother’s wedding. Before what should have been one of the happiest days of her life. And you will be here tomorrow, on what will be one of the saddest.” 

A strand of hair has fallen in Yaz’s face and the Doctor surprises herself as she lifts her hand to tuck it behind her ear. She cups Yaz’s face in her hand, feels her warmth against her own cold skin, and suddenly she realises how close they are.

She continues: “You will help her carry that sadness. And you will bring her so much happiness in the future. You are one of the constants in your grandmother’s life, Yaz. And she will love you so much.”

“Will she remember that I was here then?” There is a tinge of hope in her voice now that makes the Doctor’s hearts ache more than the anger did before. Much more. She sighs and lets her hand fall from Yaz’s face, already missing the warmth.

“She will not recognise present you as future you, no. Her memory will not allow for such a paradox. The human brain is amazing in its ability to protect itself from things it can’t comprehend.”

It’s things like this that make Yaz realise how different the Doctor is from her. From all of them. She lifts her head from her shoulder and looks up to her face. “We must seem so small to you.”

“Small? No, Yaz. Not small. Never small. Compassionate. Yes. Loving. Absolutely.” She is quiet for a moment and locks eyes with Yaz. Wants her to see herself through her eyes. “Those are big things, strong forces. And you, Yasmin Khan, have them in abundance. They make you shine.” 

Yaz cannot say when she started crying, only realises that she is when the Doctor lifts her hand to her face again to wipe away the tears. Instinctively, Yaz turns her head towards her hand and kisses it.

The feeling of her lips against her palm makes the Doctor’s hearts skip a beat each. She notices this and makes a mental note. It confirms something that she has suspected for a while now, ever since Najia enquired about the nature of her relationship to her daughter. It’s another piece in a bigger puzzle, and she promises herself to take a closer look at it all later. 

But not tonight. Tonight is about Yaz, and so she pulls her close. It has been a while since she has been a hugger, and she wants to get this right. 

“Doctor?”, she feels her voice reverberate through her body more clearly than she can hear it. “Yes, Yaz?”  
“Hold me for a bit?”   
“As long as you want.”

And as she feels Yaz relax in her arms, she thinks that she might just pull it off, as they stand under the vast sky, the night wind in their hair, and the stars above them.


	2. To everything, a season - part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another night, another sleepless Yaz.

She thought it would be easier to find peace with everything that happened once it has actually happened. 

She was wrong. 

Every time she closes her eyes, she sees her Nani’s face as she helps her pack the bare necessities. Sees her eyes, a mirror to her own, scared of an uncertain future and already heartbroken. And she hears the gunshot, its echo reverberating in her mind. 

Graham and Ryan stayed up with her long past their normal bedtime. Although there is no such thing as _normal time_ on the TARDIS, she thinks, and it almost makes her smile. But when Ryan almost fell off his chair with tiredness and Graham could hardly conceal his yawns, she shooed them to bed, swearing that she was “dead on her feet as well”.

Which was true, for once, although she had a feeling it would not equal sleep. 

She was right.

So as the night before, she gets up from her bed and starts wandering through the stillness that is the sound of other souls sleeping. 

Except for one. 

And as the night before, she is not surprised to find the Doctor, this time round in her usual place at the consoles of her ship that is also her home. 

She approaches her quietly from behind and only when she is quite close to the Doctor does she realise that she is holding a photograph of a woman with a smile so bright she can almost hear it and curls so big that they seem almost three-dimensional. 

Not wanting to startle her, Yaz softly puts her hand on the Doctor’s back and comes to stand next to her. “Who is she?”

“River. My wife. And was”, the Doctor answers with a smile and a sigh.

“Oh, Doctor, I am so sorry.”

“Don’t be. She would hate it.” 

Yaz sees a small smile playing along her lips, and it gives her the courage to ask. “What happened?”

“She died the day I first met her”, the earlier lightness to her tone is now gone, and instead there is what must amount to several lifetimes of sadness. 

And it probably does, Yaz thinks, as she watches the Doctor watching the photograph in her hands. She doesn’t want to pry, but she also wants to know, and so she asks.

“Doctor, I don’t understand. What do you mean, she died the first day you met her?”

“She was a time-traveller, like me. Lived our lives back to front, we did. First day I met her was the last day she met me.”

Now Yaz truly is sorry she asked. She lets her hand drop from the Doctor’s back, immediately missing the connection, and comes to stand in front of her. 

“That must have been horrible.” Her voice barely above a whisper.

“It was. Worse for her, though. She once said that she always dreaded the day when I would look at her and not know who she was. And it came. And then she died. Time can be cruel like that.” 

Yaz has to lean in close to catch these last words. She doesn’t know what to say, so she doesn’t say anything and instead pulls the Doctor into her arms. As the night before, this one is a good hug, and she thinks that she could get used to this, thinks that she would quite like to get used to this. 

But then she stops herself thinking and just focuses on holding the Doctor close, because this is not about her. This is about the Doctor.

“Yaz?” 

She feels her voice move through her whole body and the sensation renders her momentarily unable of coherent speech. “Hmmm?”

“Can you stay?”

“As long as you want.”

Time, she thinks. There will be time. 

Time for more. 

Time for them.


End file.
